A Little Bit Ritchie Episode 9 Transcript: The Next Chapter

Lydia Neufeld: Over the past year, A Little Bit Ritchie has commemorated the Ritchie Community League’s hundredth anniversary by investigating local history to uncover what makes Ritchie—Ritchie! To conclude our project, we spoke to members of the community to hear more about their perceptions of and hopes for the neighbourhood. I’m Lydia Neufeld, and this is A Little Bit Ritchie.

Ritchie exists on stolen land. We gather on Treaty 6 Territory and Metis Nation of Alberta Region 4, a travelling route and home to the Nehiyawak, Siksikaitsitapi, Saulteaux, Métis, Stoney Nakoda, Inuit, and other Indigenous peoples. The Ritchie Community League is exploring what the land represents while drawing attention to the harm caused by settlers and colonization. Our Reconciliation Committee continues to reflect on the Community Leagues’ existence in Ritchie and its relationship to the land.

While Ritchie has been moulded by its past, it is absolutely defined by its present. Today, we are joined by members of the Ritchie Community League Board to reflect on the Centennial Celebration, what they’ve learned from the past 100 years, and some of their hopes for the future. We asked members of the Board to discuss what they think defines the community. 

Here’s Ritchie Community League Civic’s Director and Reconciliation Committee member, Ian Mckeller:

Ian Mckeller: The things that have blown me away the most, that are the most memorable, or perhaps just some of the various events that would never expect to see so many people coming out for you know, just a small community event at a park or something like that. And we end up having, you know, 300 people coming out for a barbecue and selling out of hotdogs in the first half hour. So those kinds of things, and just, you know, how engaged the community is. 

LN: League President Avnish Nanda offers insight into the community-mindedness of Ritchie. 

Avnish Nanda: The biggest thing is the openness, the acceptance, how people invite you in, in a way that really, for me, at least, pride, a sense of belonging that empowered me to really kind of solidify Ritchie identity, but also, kind of friends that you never thought you would make, have experiences that you never thought you'd have. And sometimes this is what I really appreciate is that I was invited into conversations and activities that were focused on achieving big things. And you feel like you're part of a kind of a broader movement, a broader community, something that really gives you a sense of purpose and belonging. It felt like these folks were not only inviting me in to volunteer but also into their lives. There's a real sense of, there's a real sense of community of values and what type of neighbourhood you want to build for every resident here.

LN: Hall Revitalization Director Jeff Ollis says it’s about the people.

Jeff Ollis: What's special about Ritchie Community League is the people who are organizing these programs, and the people who spend countless hours, you know, administering programs that come to us and say, Hey, you got a space we could use and people who shovel the rink like we did this morning. That's really what makes the community better.

LN: RCL Secretary and Centennial Celebration Co-Chair Erin Fraser describes Ritchie as welcoming.

Erin Fraser: My favourite thing? I love that Richie is so diverse and inclusive. It's a community that I think really wants to come together. And, and, and help one another out. I think everyone is welcome. And everyone wants to support everyone within the community. It really I think, exemplifies what you want in community spirit. And it's really, I think, a community that you can live, work and play in. Because you work close to amenities, you're close to the things you need, like groceries and restaurants and local beer. But also, you're close to a beautiful park and skating rink, and you can go for a walk in the ravine. And, you know, there's just there's so much to do, there's so much vibrancy, and it's just kind of like it's tucked in, kind of off of, you know, like off of Whyte. And so you're, you're so close to and you're close to all like the arts and culture in the city, and sometimes even in Ritchie. But it's just like it's very vibrant, very active. And again, inclusive and accessible.

LN: Here’s Centennial Celebration Committee Co-Chair Seghan MacDonald.

Seghan MacDonald: I think which is really interesting community because we have kind of East Ritchie, which is very classic residential single-family homes, and then you have West Ritchie, which is a lot higher density, you've got those small businesses. And then we also have like a lot of amazing small businesses and breweries and restaurants all opening up. I love that I walk out my door. And I'm half a block away from a coffee shop and a block and a half from my favourite brewery like it's just it's so it's so easy to walk around and take advantage of everything that the community has to offer.

LN: It’s clear that Ritchie is an engaged and open community in a constant state of flux, adaptation, and transition. In the experiences of these community members, the neighbourhood has bent and shifted to accommodate varying circumstances, individuals, and backgrounds. 

Childhood in Ritchie has been shaped by many of the amenities the community has to offer, both today and in the past. Skating, playing in the park, and enjoying Mill Creek Ravine have all been part of childhood throughout Ritchie’s history. However, some childhood activities in the past stand out, like when Ritchie teens burned effigies of local politicians or when neighbourhood children and their parents protested in front of bulldozers in the ravine. Some of the children who live in the community right now sat down with us to share their ideas of what it might have been like to live and grow up in the Ritchie of the past.

Ritchie Kid 1: Um, I think there'd be a lot of like, maybe biking in the ravine. And based on like, TV shows I've watched I don't know. Like, maybe like building forts or playing with sticks and stuff.

Ritchie Kid 2:  Like climb trees or bike around? Maybe?

RK1: I think probably skating because skating is always going to be good. 

Ritchie Kid 3: Like, they like to climb trees. And they like to play in the park.

LN: These ideas of the past are not all that different from what kids enjoy about Ritchie today.

RK1: Well, like the ravine is just like a really beautiful place to go walking and running and anything really it's like in the fall. It's really nice with all the leaves and in the winter. It's nice with snow and it's nice to go down by the creek and just like often we throw stones and stuff. 

RK3: Oh, Kind Ice Cream and parks and our school. I really like climbing really high. And I like sliding down the slide in the park.

RK1: I think that just outside stuff is just, like, the best. It's like healthy and it's just like, oh, no, it's something that you can do always. It's like, like, outside doesn't have to update like technology does. And with the new hall. Are you thinking of putting in like a room to like, put skates on and stuff? And I think that will always be a good activity to do. 

LN: The Ritchie Community Hall is a venue for interpersonal connection, belonging, learning, understanding, and compassion across a broad range of ages, socio-economic backgrounds, and other factors. Recently the League has been busy coordinating plans for a new community hall building. The Ritchie Community League established the current grounds with a skating rink, in 1923 and built a hall in 1945. By the late 1950s, the hall was falling apart and the community league drafted new plans for a structure which was built in 1961. However, the space was hardly large enough to accommodate the league's needs, and conversations about expansion began almost immediately. By the late 1970s, the league added changerooms for the skating rink, office space, a tennis court, and improved washrooms. 

In 2014, the community league established a Hall Revitalization Committee. Its purpose is to address the deterioration of the current community hall and to begin planning a new building, as retrofitting and renovating was deemed to be impractical.1 The board identified that an upgraded building and facilities would be better equipped to serve the needs of the community, including senior citizens, the unhoused, and families, all looking for a space to gather.2 

Numerous rounds of surveys and research in 2015 highlighted a recurring desire for the new hall—for it to be environmentally conscious. Residents suggested the new hall have enough room to accommodate a variety of activities, have natural light and park views, and be environmentally sustainable.3 Therefore, the league is committed to building the hall to have a net-zero carbon performance.4 

Jeff Ollis is the Hall Revitalization Director.

JO: I know a lot about this old hall, and it was designed for wants and needs back in the late 50s and early 60s. So that was very interesting, actually, to see how the hall was originally built and designed and what the changing, changing demographic of the community requires. I'm quite proud of the fact that we did an extensive community consultation and needs assessment back in 2015. And so what is envisioned is exactly what was presented to us from the community as to what they need in the hall. So we're envisioning large windows and potentially garage doors that open up so that events can spill over into the playground and into the park. As well another value that was emphasized was environmental high environmental standards. So we've designed a hall that we're hoping will, you know, potentially be LEEDs? We're looking at crazy things like rainwater, recycling for toilets and solar, of course, and things like that.

We've put a tiny bit more emphasis on making the area around the hall a place that you might want to congregate, no matter what the weather is. And so, so we think that, I mean, hopefully, the world goes back to kind of how it was. But, you know, if it doesn't, we we’re gonna have a really comfortable place for people to hang out outside with, you know, sheltered areas where they can sit and talk, things like that. I mean, who knows how things are gonna go with technology in the future. But I think people are always going to want to get together, and I think what we've designed will meet the needs going forward. I think the hall is really going to enhance the energy that's already here and which is fed by the great people who are or enrich the community League and dedicate hours of time, to making it better.

LN: The league's current intentions were inspired by the past, but how has the past shaped what is happening in the community today? Much of the community’s growth and change has been inspired by historical wrongdoings and hardships. As we elaborated in Episode 4 of A Little Bit Ritchie, the neighbourhood exists on stolen Papaschase land. To learn more about the history of the land and the implications of the community’s presence, the board formed a Reconciliation Committee in 2021. We spoke to Seghan MacDonald, Ian Mckeller and Jenet Dooley about the Committee. Here’s Seghan and Ian.

SM: We started thinking, there's so much more to this land in this community than just the 100 years that the league has been around. And we really need to find a way to acknowledge that. And it took some time to try to figure out exactly what we wanted to do with that. So we created the Land Acknowledgement Committee, which has kind of morphed into the Reconciliation Committee to really look at our practices as a league to investigate our history, and to consider how we want to move forward.

LN: Ian speaks to the importance of the committee, 

IM: We kind of took it upon ourselves to just sort of made it an education project. And so we, as a committee sort of went on a learning experience ourselves. And tried as best as possible to share that with the board in order to inform the types of lenders judgments and statements that we wouldn't be making on an ongoing basis, as opposed to just drafting something to be another boilerplate statement.

LN: And Seghan adds,

SM: For me as part of the land acknowledgement committee, you know, we really, we really dove into the history of the lands we're on but also the history of Treaty Six and and then we shared that with the board. And there was so much learning through discussion through sharing. 

LN: Seghan also says—and here I’m quoting, “Everything I've learned has been accompanied by increased awareness of how ignorant I am, and as a result it is hard to feel like I've really learned anything substantial apart from the ignorance-awareness bit. Our learnings about treaties—their meaning and history—as well as land acknowledgments, intent, background, and perspectives on boilerplate statements, are the most meaningful to me personally. I think we’ve just scratched the surface as far as what we can learn, and how we can move toward reconciliation. It feels like more of a frame of mind or culture shift so that our decision making is always grounded in anti-racism and reconciliation. This takes time and the work is never done.”

Community League President Avnish Nanda also talks about reconciliation and what it means to him. 

AN: One aspect of Richie that we're working on is kind of reconciliation, action. And I think an emphasis on reconciliation is paramount; it's kind of front and center. But I am seeing a lot of efforts now that are not maybe are not grounded in substance. It's a lot tokenistic. It's just, you know, doing a land acknowledgement. But what I want Richie to be is really live the values that we have to, you know, not kind of spend a lot of time talking about reconciliation, but just doing the work, ensuring that our story, our history, whatever we do keeps those that those values, but those objectives in mind in terms of ensuring this community honours, experiences, the histories of indigenous folks who have always been here, but also ensures that they communities and individuals feel like they belong in our community moving forward. I think it starts with just recognizing who's in our community that indigenous folks have been in our community for a long time and are here today. 

And, you know, I have a friend who grew up in Ritchie, she's Indigenous, her grandmother still lives across the street. And I don't want us to lose sight of those folks in our programming in our advocacy, in just whatever we do that. It's not just Ritchie Community League, we're a community, and reconciliation involves us engaging indigenous folks, which are somehow like separate from our community, like their indigenous folks in our community. And like really treating our aims of addressing inequities of putting folk’s voices front and center of telling the stories at the core part of what we do. And just an example, like, you know, with my friend and her family, there has been an indication that through kind of gentrification of this neighbourhood, that kind of working-class folks, folks from a variety different backgrounds are having trouble remaining in this neighbourhood. And that's a live issue that we have to address. And it's something to some extent, we can address, especially when there are zoning discussions, other discussions around ensuring that a variety of folks can call this neighbourhood home.

LN: Though the current Community League board is committed to including, respecting, and valuing the cultures and experiences of the people who live in Ritchie, this has not always been the case. In the 1920s, the Ritchie Community League hosted minstrel shows5— a form of stage entertainment popular in the early and mid-19th century in which white entertainers wore blackface to perform caricatures of Black people, often performing “plantation songs.”6 These performances were rooted in “19th and early 20th century entertainment that expressed nostalgia for slavery and racist violence, and employed stereotypical representations of Black people.”7 

This dehumanizing and harmful entertainment was popular amongst white audiences across Canada, with performances being put on by “local amateurs at fund-raisers for schools, police forces, community groups, churches, and charitable organizations.”8

Though we found mentions of two minstrel shows hosted by the Ritchie Community League, it is possible there were more. The two shows were seemingly used as fundraisers by the Board and also as a method of uniting Ritchie School with the League through the use of shared programming. Ritchie was not the only league to conduct minstrel shows, others such as the 142nd League and King Edward League also held minstrel shows. 

President Avnish Nanda reflects on how the League’s values have evolved. 

AN: One of the first events that I did here was doing a speaker series exploring alternative histories of Edmonton, Alberta. And one of the first speakers we had was a good friend of mine named Bashir Mohammed, who has done a lot of significant work exploring the history of Black folks in Alberta in Edmonton, and I think really outlining that there's been a Black population in this province, since province before the province existed and in the city and specific treatment and how there are ongoing issues. And what was really interesting that night was at the same time that he was talking about the exclusion of Black people from city pools, racism in schools, you know, every decade has something. One of the people in the audience was this young boy, this Black boy, who was at that time suspended by the Catholic school board because he wore a durag. Him and his mother were there. And it just kind of brought it all home that a lot of the same issues that we're dealing with today. And you know, in the past, there may have been a reluctance to really address these issues head-on or even advocate on them. But I think the community but also the members who make up our community have a kind of different vision.

LN: To illustrate this evolving vision, the League has, in recent years, taken an active role in contributing to socially-oriented initiatives. Many of the League’s activities have been focussed on accessibility and inclusivity, including mental health initiatives and cultural celebrations. Jenet Dooley expands on these initiatives, saying, “The big events like the Ritchie Chill Out festival, pancake breakfasts, or hot dog BBQs are usually free to attend and participate. Part of being accessible is just being open to opportunities and recognizing the benefit of diverse events. The league has a really enthusiastic events committee that puts a lot of time into planning and hosting. Having a great team allows us to host a variety of events that interest different parts of the community.”

In February, the league held a Black History Month event hosted by community member Okama Brook and the Ritchie Community League Events Committee. The event was a showcase of African and Caribbean Culture, with a jerk chicken and jollof rice cook-off, fashion show, band and dancing, and vendor market. It was an opportunity to center Black voices and connect with a part of our community.

When the Mustard Seed opened a temporary shelter for unhoused community members in West Ritchie in 2020, the League voiced support for this initiative and encouraged League members to donate to the Mustard Seed. In January 2023, the league hosted the Boyle Street Education Event. Ian Mckeller describes the discussion as  “the second public engagement session regarding the Community Health Hub, [which] Boyle Street plans to open in the Spring.”  Though not organized by the Ritchie Community League, the board hosted the event in hopes of broadening the discussion and learning surrounding the Hub. The session addressed many of the concerns people in the community voiced about the potential impact of the Hub. 

The board also recently expressed its support of the Boyle Street Community Services’ proposed overdose prevention site in West Ritchie. The support is offered on the condition that Boyle Street honours the commitments it has made to community residents throughout its consultation. The league will continue to explore how it can advocate for the needs of all community members through unique methods. 

Avnish talks about the overlap of our past and present concerns.

AN: I think the podcast series has been great and just exploring the unique personalities, but also the experiences of our community over the last 100 years and how some of the same issues we're dealing with today when it comes to hall issues when it comes to just the history of… what really spoke to me was the initial kind of foundation of this neighbourhood where it was kind of excluded. It was maybe not the most desirable part of Edmonton, and over the course of 100 years, it's changed in, you know, a complete 180 Where it's one of the most desirable neighbourhoods, and that's a testament, I think, to the people who live here who made this place their home, and, you know, really instill that sense of belonging that we're working to together towards making this place the best place for all our residents.

LN: Looking for a way to support Ritchie Community League and the work we do? Look no further than the Ritchie Crew Subscription Service—an innovative way to display your community pride and donate monthly to the league's important programs. Starting at just $7/month, each tier offers a thank you package full of RCL swag, an annual League Membership for Ritchie dwellers, and a Ritchie Discount card, including your favourite local businesses like: Under the High Wheel, Track N’ Trail, United Cycle, and many more. Whether it’s the craft beer of the month membership, the quarterly Coffee tasting package, or free admission to RCL Events, there’s a tier to suit everyone! Check out www.ritchie-league.com for all the details.

The League is currently reflecting on its purpose and position in the community. Erin Fraser notes the Board recently approved a new strategic plan that will help guide the work of the league for the next five years. It will also help the league establish goals and priorities. The plan was influenced and guided by the league's commitment to furthering equity, diversity, inclusion, and accessibility within the organization and community. The details of the new Strategic Plan are available on the Ritchie Community League website. 

Here’s Ian Mckeller on the role of the Community League.

IM: think that the, in my opinion, the community league, our role is just to make sure that there's advocacy and that people are heard. It's not necessarily our role to determine what the future of the community is, it's just our role to make sure that there's, there's inclusion and, and that's, you know, the community itself is able to, to endure the many shifts and, and changes that take place and that, you know, we are still a whole community in the other on the other end of things.

LN: At the core, Community Leagues allow neighbourhood residents to participate in civic affairs. Leagues unite neighbours and empower them to evoke real change in their communities. Community programming, past and present, allows individuals to be constantly interconnected.  Though we are all experiencing a degree of uncertainty in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, we guarantee that the league will continue to advocate for the rights of all people living in Ritchie and by extension, Edmonton as a whole.

Thank you for joining us throughout our Centennial Celebration and for tuning in to the final episode of A Little Bit Ritchie. If you enjoyed this episode, please give us a rating and a review! A Little Bit Ritchie is brought to you by the Ritchie Community League Centennial Celebration Committee. Erin Fraser and Seghan MacDonald chair the committee. This episode was researched by Linnea Bell and written by Elyse Colville. A Little Bit Ritchie is edited by Castria Communications and Media Solutions. This project is supported by the Edmonton Heritage Council and the City of Edmonton. Thank you to Tierra Connor for creating our artwork.

To learn more about the initiatives discussed in this episode, detailed show notes, a transcription, and references, visit the link in our description. 

Thank you for your extended support over the past year as we have explored the history of the land we call Ritchie and the people who have come to define the community. 

Thank you for listening to A Little Bit Ritchie. I’m Lydia Neufeld.

Endnotes

1.  “GICB Grant Application Ritchie Community League, July 6, 2021.

2.  “Ritchie Public Meetings: Ritchie Hall Revitalization, May 2015”

3.  “Ritchie Public Meetings: Ritchie Hall Revitalization, May 2015”

4.  GICB Grant Application Ritchie Community League, July 6, 2021.

5.  "Ritchie League Gives Concert," The Edmonton Bulletin, 1924 May 10, 12; and "Community leagues," The Edmonton Bulletin, 1928 Mar. 27, 6.

6.  "Community leagues," The Edmonton Bulletin, 1928 Mar. 27, 6.

7.  P.S.S Howard, “Blackface in Canada”, Arts Against PostRacialism, 2017, Accessed Mar. 3 2023, https://www.mcgill.ca/aapr/blackface-canada.

8.  P.S.S Howard, “Blackface in Canada”, Arts Against PostRacialism, 2017, Accessed Mar. 3 2023, https://www.mcgill.ca/aapr/blackface-canada.